


Gifts of Silver and Stone

by tirsynni



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:27:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26496358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tirsynni/pseuds/tirsynni
Summary: Some lit incense and left out food and pretty things. Ganondorf left out pots and Link happily left them in pieces, bringing back treasures each time.Ganondorf and Link and brief moments before the end.
Relationships: Ganondorf/Link (Legend of Zelda)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 196





	Gifts of Silver and Stone

**Author's Note:**

> The absolutely hilarious thing is that this pairing is definitely not my OTP, but I love figuring out ways they could work.

When they first met, the wave of  _ deju vu _ almost swept Ganondorf off his feet. 

Ganondorf was sixteen. The boy was, at most, twelve. He was short, with blue eyes too big for his face and a too-sharp sword in his tiny hands and a broken pot at his feet. Then the shopkeeper yelled and the boy bolted, vanishing in a green and golden blur.

Three days later, Ganondorf saw him again, this time actively breaking a pot. In the chaos which followed, Ganondorf saw himself somehow not only paying for the pots but losing the treasure he had spent the last three months hunting.

Two weeks later, he was formally introduced to the Hylian Princess and saw the boy again. Holding his treasure. 

More chaos followed.

For the next several years, he saw the boy intermittently. They all had their duties. Soon, the Sages claimed, the darkness would rise again, and all of the peoples of Hyrule needed to be ready for it. The Sheikah prepared grand weapons and Ganondorf prepared both his people and himself. He saw the boy --  _ Link _ \-- flit in and out of his life, always busy, moving as quickly and mysteriously as the fairies. Who were his parents? Where did he come from?

When he asked his mothers, they only shrugged. He was the Hero, they said. Only the Goddesses knew.

When Ganondorf thought of the green-clad Hero of his mothers’ tales, he didn’t think of a boy destroying pots.

On Ganondorf’s birthday, he met Link again. The three plain pots in Ganondorf’s room were destroyed, but Link was at least gracious enough not to touch the other ones. Looking older and far more sheepish than Ganondorf remembered, Link offered him  _ his own treasure _ , along with several diamonds and rubies and sapphires. Link never provided an explanation for any of it. So quietly Ganondorf barely heard him, Link said, “Happy Birthday.”

Then he slipped out of Ganondorf’s window. His third floor window. In the morning, Ganondorf would have suspected it to be a fever dream if not for the odd combination of presents on his desk.

Where did a teenage boy even  _ find _ jewels like that?

The Sheikah bid him to choose a Champion for the Gerudo Divine Beast. They ignored his arguments that he should do it himself, and on his eighteenth birthday, on the day of his coronation as Gerudo King, Ganondorf received his crown and named his Champion. Link watched from the crowd. When Ganondorf asked the Sheikah about  _ him _ , they said he was his own Divine Beast.

That night, Link appeared in his bedroom again, uncaring that it was on the third floor, and offered Ganondorf a sword as large as Link was tall. Ganondorf never determined how he carried it to Ganondorf’s room unseen.

Link vanished into the wild, and Ganondorf focused on his own tasks. He supported the Gerudo Champion as much as he could while preparing his people for a mysterious war. The Sages knew the darkness would awaken soon but no one was helpful enough to provide a date or even how the darkness would arrive. 

_ Soon _ , they said, so often Ganondorf began to see the darkness in his dreams.

Over the next three years, Ganondorf saw Princess Zelda more often than he saw Link. The Princess took her father’s place at meetings. She was strong and wise and Ganondorf could have liked her if not for the sorrow in her eyes when she looked at him. Like the Sheikah, she knew more of the darkness than she spoke, and unintentionally, she held it over his head like a sword.

On Ganondorf’s twenty-first birthday, Link came again. He brought his large blue eyes and a magnificent golden shield and pointed to the shadows beyond Ganondorf’s window. When Ganondorf looked, there was a grand horse big enough to crush Link without missing a step. Ganondorf had thought that breed dead.

He wasn’t surprised that it was Link who brought him one.

All of the pots on Ganondorf’s windowsill were broken.

It was Ganondorf’s first look at Link as a man, and he was more breathtaking than the shield and horse both. He was still small to Ganondorf’s eyes, and when he cupped Link’s cheek, his hand covered the entire left side of Link’s face.

“Don’t wait for my next birthday,” Ganondorf said quietly. Their time was running out.

Link nodded, ever solemn. He knew it, too. Possibly better than Ganondorf.

Some lit incense and left out food and pretty things. Ganondorf left out pots and Link happily left them in pieces, bringing back treasures each time. Rito bows and jewels and magnificent scales and claws Link swore came from dragons. If anyone else had said so, Ganondorf would have called them a liar. 

Ganondorf taught him how to shield surf through the desert and told him the tales his mothers passed down to him. They rode into the sands together and fought a Molduga together.

When Ganondorf was twenty-two and Link eighteen, Link came to his bedroom in the night and this time stayed.

For the first time in years, Ganondorf didn't dream of the darkness.

It didn’t matter. In the morning, Ganondorf met the Sheikah, and they told him at last from whence the darkness would come.

Link’s presents changed. Weapons turned into charms, protection amulets. Ganondorf returned from meetings to find strange candles glowing in his room, reflecting off the shattered remains of pots. Once he returned to Link already waiting for him in bed, a Zoran charm glowing blue and brilliant above him. He awoke to Link, still naked and damp with sweat, his tongue sticking out between his teeth, tying a dangly bracelet around Ganondorf’s wrist. It proved too small, so Link made it an elaborate ring instead.

Eventually, even Link’s presence couldn’t keep the darkness away. Link refused to budge.

Princess Zelda came more often, the grief endless in her eyes. Ganondorf wondered how long she had known. He didn’t ask.

When the time came, Ganondorf kissed Link good-bye and bid him to take care of his horse. It was Princess Zelda who dragged Link away.

In the darkness, when Ganondorf dreamed, he dreamed of Link, with his too large eyes and clad in green.

When he saw Link again, as if through the haze of a drugged dream, Link wore blue.

Ganondorf could no longer remember why, but he hoped someone remembered to leave out pots.

Then there wasn’t even darkness anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> More fandom and fic info available on my [tumblr](https://tirsynni.tumblr.com/). :D


End file.
